Produced in association with our mates at La Trobe University.
These days it’s more than likely that you’re satisfying at least some your entertainment needs online, through methods described at best as ‘alternative’ and ‘questionable’.
As our media consumption habits continue to evolve, it makes sense that the way it’s gestating is changing too. Some of the most popular and critically-acclaimed series currently in circulation scored development deals with established networks after spending their formative years as web series.
Broad City enjoyed two series online before Amy Poehler took Abbi Jacobson and Illana Glazer on as protégées. Workaholics began in a similar fashion as 5thyear before receiving a green light for the first of its five seasons. As an exemplary case study closer to home, Nick Boshier and The Van Vuuren Bros (of Bondi Hipsters notoriety) are are great example in favour of creating, watching and sharing quality web-based content.
With that in mind, you’d be well-advised to invest some quality IRL buffering time into the web series’ most ardent advocate Melbourne WebFest and its Official Selection video.
Now in its second year in partnership with La Trobe University and with a global alliance of events in LA WebFest, Rome and Marseille, Melbourne WebFest is the only forum of its kind in the southern hemisphere devoted entirely to elevating the web series to the heights it deserves.
Taking place over a long weekend from the 18th to the 20th of July, Melbourne Webfest boasts an impressive official selection of thirty two web series from eleven countries, including the brilliant Convos With My Two-Year-Old (Canada), the tense fixer drama Blood Brothers (US) and Manigances, a high-concept French meta-thriller that reads like an engrossing David Fincher whodunnit.
Steinar Ellingsen, director of Melbourne Webfest and journalism lecturer at La Trobe University, whose Arts and Communications students are also instrumental in the running of the festival, commended the “[overwhelming] amount of submissions we’ve got this year – more than 170 submissions from 20 countries.
“These creators are writing the rules of the game as they go and they are building an industry from the ground up.“
For more information regarding tickets, the festival program and its surrounding events head to melbournewebfest.com.
To experience Melbourne WebFest as a VIP and win tickets to Opening Night, screenings of the Official Selection and the Awards Ceremony at Deakin Edge, email your vital stats to comps@pedestriangroup.com.au with ‘Melbourne WebFest’ as the title. 
